Difference Between Male and Female Frogs

Frogs are fascinating creatures of the animal kingdom with some very interesting characteristics. They are considered as biological indicators due to their super sensitive lifestyle to the environment. Frogs live more in water than on the ground, and very sensitive to the environmental changes. When the males and females are considered, there are many distinguishing characteristics to be paid attention. In addition to the morphological feature, there are very important behavioural differences between male and female frogs. However, it would be very difficult to identify the male from females without prior knowledge, just by looking at a frog.

Male Frogs

With the presence of the male reproductive system, some internal hormones are secreted into their blood during the mating period in male frogs to stimulate them for many activities, yet all those proceed to the ultimate goal of mating with a female. Their testicles are not visible to the exterior and are kept inside the body. The produced sperms in the testicles travel into the spermatic canal and externally fertilize the released eggs of the female. The male frog mounts on top of the back of female during mating and he grabs her with his tiny pads developed in the forelegs called Nuptial Pads.

Usually, the size of male frogs is smaller than the females of the same age in same species. However, male has developed some brighter appearance than the female, which caters him to attract sex mates. Some species mate in the night and the colourations do not matter for those species. Therefore, the loud calls are important to attract a female for mating. They can enlarge their throat, so that it acts as a resonator to increase the volume of the sound created from their croaks as in the sound hole of a box guitar. A small croak develops into a loud groan, which makes the female frog think as a large and muscular male. Thus, the poor female attract towards the male for mating. However, male frogs, sometimes, can misidentify other objects to female, as they try to mount on small logs or rocks. In addition, there are some tiny males that get the advantage of a loud groaning male’s call, as they sneakily mount and mate with the attracting female towards the other frog.

Female Frogs

Females are the highly demanding creatures of frogs, which is mainly due to the presence of their most-wanted female reproductive system that can comforts the males during the mating season. One of the most defining differences of the female from the males is the presence of the ovaries and oviduct. The external opening of the reproductive system is the cloaca, which can be easily observed at the underside of the female. Females are neither very colourful nor very vocal. They hear well but do not make continuous calls as the males do. However, the females make the distress calls. The body size of females is usually larger than the males of the same species. This large body size is believed to be beneficial for them to store a large number of eggs. Their front legs are thin, which eases the male to grasp her tightly with his nuptial pads during mating. However, the females prefer to mate with strong and large males; hence, they attract towards the frogs with loud calls.

What is the difference between Male and Female Frogs?

• Males are smaller than females of the same species.

• Males are more vocal than females, especially during the mating season.

• The female cloaca is more visible to the exterior than the male cloaca.

• Males are usually brighter than females in colourations.

• The forelegs are thinner in females than in males.

• Males have nuptial pads but not the females.

• Male mounts on the female. In other words, male stays on top while female waits at the bottom during mating.

• Females lay eggs while males release sperms into the water after mating.